FATHER’S DAY THOUGHTS (FOR FATHERS
WHO MESSED UP - AND MESSED UP FATHERS)
For those of us who received cards from our children who gave cards to someone else they call ‘dad’ For those of us who received cards from someone else’s children, who call us ‘dad’ For those of us who received no cards from children who live with us or away from us, for whom we tried to do our best and never meant to disappoint whose existence we imagined as we gave vows to their mothers whom we held in disbelieving awe at the moment of their birth whom we fed and clothed and bathed and changed and loved –
built your cots, painted your nurseries, bought your toys took you to your playgroups, to your friends, your schools and even when we couldn’t, wished we could, already sensing the growing gap between our lives and yours Cruelly widened when the separation came.
And a Father’s Day that ought to signal gratitude and love now speaks of distant memories, and of what might have been and whispers, mocking, not of our achievement but our failure, our irrelevance, our loss.
So as we look at cards suspiciously or doubting or gaze ruefully at mantelpiece bereft let’s console ourselves with moments that were precious conversations we can cherish, smiles we shared that can never be expressed in cards and greetings from our children, someone else’s or from none
Let’s remember how we once made happy families Though those families vanished, fathers we remain To
those who call us dad, or never call us And find a little comfort 'midst the pain.
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